


Thoughts

by mmouse15



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-09
Updated: 2018-01-09
Packaged: 2019-03-02 21:53:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13327122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mmouse15/pseuds/mmouse15
Summary: Tony thinks about things.





	Thoughts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [prodigal_son_tm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/prodigal_son_tm/gifts).



The thing was, Tony could understand why people didn't like him. He thought twice as fast as other people, he had a genius level IQ, and he had the money to make his wildest dreams come true. If it didn't exist, he could invent it and make it exist. He was limited, really, by his imagination, and that was not much of a limit.

The other thing was, Tony was very good at reading people. He learned with his father. Howard had, evidently, been quite the fun guy when he was younger. At least, Aunt Peggy thought so, and she was almost as sharp as he was, so he gave her opinion a lot of weight. Howard Stark had been fun. But then he got old, and married, and he had a kid, and all the fun was flushed out of him. Tony had a deep fear of marriage and aging for that reason. He liked being fun.

Pepper was good for him. She was calm while he was frenetic, she was focused while he was bouncing from point to point, and she was organized. Tony had never been organized a day in his life. His idea of being organized was shoving piles of papers and books to one side to clear space for whatever he was currently working on.

Anyway. Tony is smart, he's rich, and he doesn't suffer fools at all. So people don't like him. Plus, he's never met a line he's not willing to cross, just to see what happens. Look at Bruce Banner. Everyone's so scared of his alter ego they treat the man like he's made of glass. He's not. Bruce Banner could probably survive the end of the world, just because Hulk can. He's not fragile. What Bruce needs is someone who challenges his brain, makes him see that just because of an accident, taking his brain off-line by hiding it in third world countries is unacceptable. Tony is the right person for that. He pushes until Bruce comes to work in the Avengers Tower, working again on the super soldier serum now that they have the original recipient.

And there's the problem. Steve Rogers doesn't like Tony. He had liked Howard, back when Howard was fun, but he didn't like Tony. Steve respected Clint and Bruce, was bemused by Thor, and liked Natasha, but not Tony. It shouldn't hurt, but it does. Howard had liked Steve better than Tony. He'd spent a month, every year of his life, trying to find Steve's plane. A fortune, poured into the Arctic, looking for a dead man that turned out to not be really dead.

Everything Tony did to try and get Steve to like him backfired. They'd done well against the Chitauri, but then the Avengers had scattered, and Tony had gotten absorbed in making Bruce feel like he had a home. Then Ultron happened, and Tony lost JARVIS. Vision was interesting, but he wasn't JARVIS any longer, and Tony pushed aside the grief of that loss. Ultron had made Steve push back against Tony even harder. When the Accords had been proposed, Tony had grabbed at them as a way to control himself. No, they weren't perfect, but Steve had been unreasonable. Tony had lost Pepper, and he couldn't communicate with Steve for some reason, and she wasn't there to act as his interpreter. He'd failed to convince Steve, and he'd pushed, because he was sure Steve could see his reasons. He just hadn't considered how attached Steve was to Bucky Barnes, that Steve would choose Barnes over everyone else. Their fight in the Siberian base had shown Tony that he was always going to be second to Barnes. And it really shouldn't hurt, but it did.

Which led to now, with Tony sitting in Steve's office, staring at the few things he'd left behind, and holding an old flip phone with one number in its contact list. Tony tipped his head back, letting it rest against the chair. He wondered if he'd ever be able to communicate with Steve. For all his genius, Tony couldn't see how to make Steve understand.

Tony was just trying to be Steve's friend.

~fin


End file.
